Tanners want safety of investment at Savar

Tanners from a human chain on Saturday demanded that the government must ensure safety of their investments in the new Tannery Industrial Park at Savar.
Chamra Shilpa Rakkha Oikya Parishad, a platform of 20 tannery-related businesses, organised the programme in front of National Press Club where they also placed their nine-point charter of demands.
The Parishad coordinator and Bangladesh Finished Leather, Leather Goods and Footwear Exporters’ Association chairman, Mohiuddin Ahmed Mahin, complained that Bangladesh Small and Cottage Industries Corporation could not install the facilities which would make the industries environment-friendly. 
Due to irregularities of BSCIC, the new tannery park turned out to be a huge risky sector for their investment. 
He feared that if they would ever start production in Savar, the area would turn into another Hazaribagh and they would soon have to relocate their industries from there.
‘We are afraid about our investment as the BSCIC failed to install central effluent treatment plant, dumping yard and other facilities in the new site,’ he said.
He blamed the BSCIC and environmentalists for plotting against the second largest export-oriented industries after garment to destroy.
Bangladesh Tanners Association chairman Shaheen Ahmed, also coordinator of the parishad, said they would never relocate their industries until the BSCIC ensured that the central effluent treatment plant they were setting up was world class.
Shaheen said they would again be evicted on the same allegation of polluting the environment as the BSCIC could not ensure the facilities yet,’ he said.
‘We want environment-friendly leather park in Savar so that none can raise any question about it in future,’ he said.
He demanded implementation of their nine-point demand that include water and electricity supply connections to their factories at Savar and registering the industrial plots allocated to them in accordance with the memorandum of understanding signed in 2003.
Among others, the Parishad leader and Tannery Workers Union president, Abul Kalam Azad, Bangladesh Hide and Skin Merchants Association chairman Delwar Hossain and meat traders association secretary general Rabiul Alam were present.

 

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